Social PressureThere’s an awful lot of noise out there, especially online, and it’s incredibly easy to feel like you’re doing everything wrong.

You’re not, you just need more perspective.

A lot of people write bad codeJust like a lot of people are bad writers, bad singers, or bad at maths.

Startups with $2m seed funding can have bad code.

People who work for Google can write bad code.

Even great companies and great developers write bad code.

All we can do is keep practicing, and keep learning.

People only talk about the good stuffNo one talks about the fact that they were up til 2am trying to fix a simple bug, or the fact that in their day job they’re stuck working on legacy code.

They talk about their side projects, and the latest shiny thing they tried.

Social media makes it seem like everyone’s working their dream job, but actually a lot of people are working long hours to tight deadlines, and leaving the office well into the evening.

People have different prioritiesSome people see development as their main interest, and some people have other priorities, and other things in their lives.

Some people live for the newest tech, some people are dead set on their side hustle, and some people just want to be popular on social media.

You don’t have to keep up with people who spend every spare minute reading the latest blog posts.

Let them sum it up for you.

Articles are deceptivePeople like to write articles about what’s possible, not what’s common practice.

Most stuff you don’t need on a day-to-day basis.

Just because it’s cool or impressive doesn’t mean it’s useful, or that you need to be able to do it.

Job adverts exaggerateJob adverts seem to have endless lists of requirements, but they’re written with the perfect candidate in mind.

A lot of what’s listed you will need, but the rest is often just fantasy.

Some of it you’ll learn on the job, some of it they want to use but aren’t in practice, and some of it is just part of their 5-year roadmap.

Make sure your managers are informedSometimes your managers aren’t aware of the level of work involved in things.

Maybe they’re not technical, or maybe their knowledge is out of date, but often they don’t realise that you can’t just “add a dropdown”, that actually it’s a custom select component with autocomplete functionality which needs two new API routes.

ToolsetCoding’s just part of it, and having a good set of tools will help you to work smarter, and to better-manage your workload.

Spend time on core skillsSkills like problem solving, critical thinking & testing are like power-ups for developers.

Dedicating a little time to learning how to approach problems in a methodical and systematic way will save you countless hours going round in circles.

And they’re helpful in every area of life.

Use proper project management toolsPlan your projects.

Manage your tasks.

Track your bugs.

Use git for version control.

These tools all exist for a reason, and they help you keep track of everything that’s going on.

You’re not supposed to store everything in your tiny human brain.

Minimise duplicate workThere are things you do a lot, and some of them you can cut out to make things easier.

Use a good code editor.

Features like autocomplete and tooltip definitions help you to get on with coding without hopping around the codebase trying to figure out what’s going on.

Use snippets.

A good code editor will let you set up snippets with shortcuts, but sometimes it’s just good to keep things in a a file that you can copy and paste.

If you find yourself googling the same thing all the time, put it in your snippets file with a comment describing it, so you can find it easily.

Keep track of reasoning.

Often you’ll find yourself working through some code trying to figure out why you designed it that way.

It’s a lot of cognitive overhead to repeatedly try and understand the same thing, and documenting your code well will help you save time & energy.

Fresh air, exercise, and conversationSitting in a room staring at a screen for 10 hours straight isn’t healthy.

You can get too caught up in imaginary problems and lose sight of the big picture.

It’s important to get out of your own head, as well as to keep your body and brain healthy.

Go outside.

Pet a dog.

Let your eyes readjust.

Talk to someone who doesn’t know what HTML is.

Ask for helpThe people in your community want to support you.

That’s why they write articles, build open source projects, and ask if you need anything from the shop.

Ask for good resources, pointers, or support with your workload.

Usually they’ll be glad to help.

Hopefully there’s been at least one idea here that’s helped you feel that life’s a bit more manageable.

But I’ll leave you with one more.

Close your damn tabs.

What helps you feel on top of everything?.Leave your suggestions below.